Flat flexible electrical cables have been used for many years, wherein a flat cable includes a flexible substrate having a plurality of flat conductors arranged thereon at intervals parallel to one another. The conductors may be attached to the flexible substrate, inlaid in grooves in the substrate, or the flat flexible cable may be in the form of a flexible printed circuit. A wide variety of electrical connectors have been employed for connecting the respective flat conductors of such cables to respective terminals in the connectors, the terminals having lead wires coupled thereto, or the respective terminals may be coupled to conductors on printed circuit boards.
Generally, prior electrical connectors for flat flexible cable have included dielectric housings having elongate recesses with a plurality of terminals at intervals along the recesses. Each terminal has a contact portion for engaging a respective one of the flat conductors of the flexible cable when an end of the cable is inserted into the recess. Problems always have been encountered in establishing good electrical connections between the flat conductors of the flexible cable and the terminals of the connector, and the problems continue to persist. Consequently, various forms of adapters, connector covers and the like have been employed, removably mounted on the electrical connector, to provide some type of pressure engagement between the flexible cable and the connector terminals.
For instance, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,969,840 to Ii et al, dated Nov. 13, 1990, and assigned to the assignee of the present invention, an electrical connector is disclosed for a flat flexible cable, the connector having a housing with a plurality of terminals arranged at intervals along a recess. A connector cover is removably mounted on the connector housing. The distal end of a flat flexible cable is inserted into the recess, the cable being provided with a lock hole for interengagement with a locking projection in the connector housing. The cover then is inserted into the recess, and the cover has a pressure blade which displaces each terminal and thereby resiliently holds the flat conductors on the flexible cable between a contact portion of each terminal and the pressure blade as well as electrically connecting the flat conductors and the contact portions of the terminal. With such an arrangement, the distal end of the flat flexible cable is inserted into the housing recess in a separate step, before the removable cover and its pressure blade is inserted into the recess. In addition, there is no wiping action of the flat conductors over the contact portions of the terminals, which is desirable in many such electrical connectors.
Another type of flat flexible cable connector is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,696,319 to Olsson, dated Oct. 3, 1972. This patent discloses a connector which includes an adaptor in the form of an actuator with a blade portion about which an end of the flexible cable is wrapped such that the cable moves together with the actuator into engagement with the terminal contacts located in the connector housing to provide a wiping action between the cable conductors and the terminal contact portions. However, this patent requires that the substrate at the distal end of the flexible cable be removed to expose the flat conductors which are then located in grooves at the end of the blade portion so that the flat conductors are registered with the connector terminal contact portions. Such an arrangement is unduly tedious and expensive in that it involves stripping the substrate from around the flat conductors and then manipulating the conductors into the grooves of the actuator. Such a system is not very amenable for field termination.
Still another type of electrical connector for flat flexible cable is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,080,595 to Mouissie et al, dated Jan. 14, 1992. Like the Olsson patent, an adaptor again includes one or more actuators having blade portions about which the end of a flexible cable is wrapped for insertion into the connector housing. The blade portion has small pins projecting from a nose thereof for insertion into small holes in the flexible cable to maintain registration. Again, such an arrangement requires considerable manipulation of the flexible cable relative to the adaptor and is not very easy to use, particularly for field termination.
This invention is directed to solving the various problems of the prior art, as exemplified above, by providing an extremely simple arrangement of an electrical connector assembly wherein the flat flexible cable can be readily positioned on an adaptor and conjointly inserted into a recess of the connector housing, providing proper registration for the cable as well as a wiping action of the cable conductors over the connector terminals.